It is one of the most extraordinary anomalies in the female character, that, having once outstepped the boundaries that are never even thought upon but with danger, it plunges deeper and deeper still into irretrievable ruin. Perhaps it is because women must feel most acutely that society never permits them to retrieve, or, what is much the same, takes no cognisance of their repentance, be it ever so sincere: their station once lost is never to be regained; it would seem as if Dante's inscription on the gates of Hell were to be for ever their motto--"All hope abandon." Man may err, and err, and be forgiven; but poor woman, with all his temptations and but half his strength, is placed beyond the pale of earthly salvation if she be but once tempted into crime! It is a hard, even though it may be a salutary law. It must be borne in mind that Zillah had committed as great an iniquity in the eyes of her people by marrying as by intriguing; nor could she expect pardon for either one or the other, except by some wonderful and powerful interposition, such as Burrell held out. It was astonishing to witness the fortitude with which the fragile and delicate Jewess, who had been clothed in purple and fine linen, fed on the most costly viands, and slept on the most downy couch, encountered the illness, terrors, and miseries attendant on a sea voyage in the vessel of a Buccaneer. The Fire-fly certainly deserved every encomium bestowed upon her by her captain; yet was she not the most pleasing residence for a delicately-nurtured female. No murmur escaped her sealed lips, nor, in fact, did she perceive the inconveniences by which she was surrounded; her mind was wholly bent upon the prevention of Sir Willmott Burrell's marriage, of which she had heard from undoubted authority; and it would appear that she had no feelings, no ideas to bestow upon, or power to think of, other things.